The Sixteenth Chapter

I was “ushered” into my office on Mobil Avenue and thrown into a chair. For whatever reason, I hadn’t expected Karael to be that physically strong. Then again, the one time I’d gotten a look at him, he’d looked like a gangly, average teenage boy. The guy in front of me looked more like a football player than my actual football player boyfriend. Had he always looked like that?

The asshole walked over to the desk and took off that stupid half mask. He didn’t set it on the desk, but dropped it, letting it clatter as if he didn’t even want it anymore. Was he pissed off? What did he have to be pissed off about? I was the one who apparently got played like a cheap fiddle.

Of course, he wasn’t pissed, I discovered as he started laughing his ass off. I’d never heard such a sound of pure, unadulterated evil villain laughter. If he wasn’t real, he’d be a cartoon. “Oh, ho ho oh, Danielle, I have nothing but thanks for you. If it weren’t for you, I’d still be lookin’ for the damn key.”

“Key to what, dickbag?”

He walked over to me and I saw what had to be the dictionary definition of a slasher smile. “The key, Danielle, to the end of the world.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

He walked away from me. “Not the literal end of the world, of course. And not that Darkness crap you and the old man came up with, no. See, you gave me exactly what I needed to set my real plan in motion.” He waved his hand and a doorway appeared in the middle of the room.

A doorway that led to God’s office.

“See, dear Danielle, I’ve been hatchin’ this little scheme since I was--” he put on a fake Irish accent for whatever reason, likely to insult his dad who was in no way Irish, “--but a wee lad--” back to his natural Texan, “--livin’ with your two favorite angels.”

“You’ve been cooking this whatever it is up for that long? Did you ever think to just ask God into his office? He’s let me in more than once.”

He wagged his finger. “Ah, but of course he did. You bein’ his little girl, and all.”

Great. Of course, the bad guy would know that before I did. "I'm sure that had nothing to do with it."

"I'm sure you'd see it that way. Point is, Miss Danielle, that without a key into the Boss's office, I wasn't gettin' into the Boss's office.”

“And what the hell do you need in there?”

“Admin access.”

I blinked. “What?”

“Think of it, girl! What’s the one thing the two of us have in common? Neither of us had a father in our lives who cared one shit about us. And we ain’t the only ones. Think about all the kids out there that grew up miserable because of their home life. Or all the ones that ended up homeless because their parents were pieces of rat shit. There are kids out there who don’t even have families, broken or not.” He grabbed the sides of the chair. “I’m gonna go in there, get on God’s computer, and I’m gonna change it all. People will finally be happy, no kids growin’ up without parents, without families. The world the way it was meant to be.”

I shifted nervously in the chair. “You really think you can just do that? I may not have gotten through all my reading for the job, but I do know that even changes God makes need to be filtered through the files in Records first before they can take root down on Earth.”

He stood there blank-faced for a second before finally bursting into what can only be described as maniacal laughter. “Look at you, thinkin’ I ain’t got all this planned out.” He shook the chair, the bastard. “How do you think I knew about God bein’ your daddy? I had a couple of folks goin’ around Records changing what I needed, settin’ the stage for the Great Change I’ve got just about ready to pop off.” He snapped his fingers and the image of two people appeared on the wall across from the chair. “I’m sure you recognize them.”

He was right, I did. Ginny’s parents.

“After you buttered ‘em up by nearly killin’ ‘em, I finished the job, turned ‘em into Heavenly office workers. I even let that stupid little cunt Brandy see me goin’ into their house so that she’d bring it up to you. Once they got their little reward, I had ‘em changin’ things, a few each day so it didn’t look out of place whenever one of the bigwigs would take a little tour.” He gave himself a standing ovation. “Ain’t it a genius plan, Danielle?”

I glared at him. “And when you tortured Ginny?”

He picked up his mask and started playing with it. “That was just a little demonstration, to get you pissed off. I’d already set the finale in motion, and just needed to give you the push you needed. That got you on the road to Jubril, and that got you on the road to the old man, which got you here.” He tossed the mask at the corner of the room, and I heard it shatter. “She’s down in Hell now, runnin’ the register at an In-N-Out Burger.” He laughed again. “You shoulda seen the look on her face when I told her that because her folks believed in that antiquated ‘Queers go to Hell’ bullshit, she’d have to follow suit.”

I felt tears hit my cheeks. “You’re a fucking monster, you know that?”

This seemed to genuinely enrage him, as he quickly spun around and slammed into my jaw with a right hook. I was on the floor instantly, and could taste blood in my mouth. Christ, he was strong, almost bodybuilder strong. I was almost wondering if I’d actually be able to beat this asshole. I hadn’t felt any more of my power returning to me after I got here, despite what Azrael had said. Was I just screwed coming here?

“A monster?” he whispered. “A MONSTER?!” he screamed. “Is trying to make sure no kid grows up in a broken home the work of a monster? Is tearing down a flawed system and replacing it with one that actually works for the people the work of a monster?! You were supposed to understand this, you stupid bitch!”

I had clearly pissed him off.

And that was exactly what I wanted.

---

After my fifth failed attempt at transporting myself to Heaven, I fell to my knees in the sand and just wanted to give up. This was starting to turn out hopeless. All I’d succeeded in doing, after the big light show, was kicking up a bunch of sand that stayed in the air for a good hour. It actually looked kinda pretty, so I made a mental note to remember how I did that.

Hadraniel walked up and knelt down beside me. "You look buggered."

"Thank you for the unwelcome Britishism, Ronny."

He rolled his eyes. "Listen, can we go somewhere and talk?"

I shrugged. "Sure, where?"

He grabbed my hand and pulled me to my feet, then pushed me forward a few feet. Thing was, I suddenly wasn't on the beach anymore. He and I were suddenly alone in what looked like a cabin. There were two chairs sitting beside a fireplace, a small kitchen just on the other side of a half wall, and a pair of doors, one marked with a restroom symbol.

Hadraniel walked over to the refrigerator and pulled out a couple cans of beer, then a third one that he handed to me. "Just a little place we can talk without anyone else interrupting us."

"How…"

"My dad, Raziel. He's known for keeping secrets, and has this place secluded from prying eyes up in Heaven. Sam still hasn't mastered the ability to come here. Not even the Boss knows where this is, though he knows of it. It's one of only two places in all of existence that Heaven can't see."

I popped the tab on the beer and sat down in one of the chairs. “Okay. What did you wanna talk about?”

He sat down in the other chair. “I’ve been thinking of Karael. Something about the fact that he hasn’t even tried to find even a bad way to stop us just has me… Bothered.”

“Azrael said that if Karael comes to stop me, he’ll just end up giving me the rest of the power because of my connection.”

He nodded. “And that’s all Johnny on the spot, but getting to you isn’t the only way he could do that.”

“What do you mean?”

He leaned forward. “He could take any of us. Me, Sam, your boyfriend, the Greek, Azrael. We’re all your emotional support and a teacher in Azrael. Azrael in particular, even. If he took that old twat out of the picture, he’d put an end to all of this. No one to teach you how to get to Heaven, no way you get your power back."

I took a sip. "So you think he wants for me to get into Heaven?"

He nodded. "Mostly, I'm saying we can't discount the possibility. There's something else going on here, that much I'm certain of."

I took a longer sip. "Alright. Say you're right, say… Say Karael is playing us so that I get into Heaven, what does that mean? Is there something up there he can only do because I'm there?"

He shrugged. "You're the Boss's daughter, so, theoretically you should have access to all the secret parts of Heaven that even the archangels can't get to. The cell block, the mainframe, the Boss's office… Any of those could be his bloody target, and all of them have some kind of value."

"God's office…" Like a lightning bolt from Thandie's dad, a thought sparked to life. "Can't you make changes to reality in God's office?"

Hadraniel went stiff. "And with God on Earth, the only way in is a blood relative."

"But what would he want to change?"

He shook his head. "That doesn't matter. What does matter is that I have a plan, now."

I raised an eyebrow. "Should I be worried about this plan?"

"Considering I just shat it out in less than a minute, yes, I believe you should."

---

I wiped blood from my mouth and looked around to see Karael had done exactly what I wanted him to do: stand there, practically foaming at the mouth because I'd insulted him. This gave me the perfect opportunity, so I took it. I got up and jumped on his back, the put him in a sleeper hold. He scrambled to get me off, but didn't immediately succeed.

When he finally did throw me off, he did something else I wanted him to do and threw me directly at the portal he'd opened into God's office. I hit the ruined desk again, which left me with the bottom half of my shirt torn clean off, but I was right where I needed to be. And more importantly, he was right where he needed to be.

"Hey asshole," I said as I stood up, choking back my internal laughter at how he'd started playing into mine and Hadraniel's plan. "You really should learn to read the 'Employees Only' signs." I held up my hand and with a snap of my fingers, the portal irised closed. My last look at him was his supremely pissed off face just before the portal disappeared.

I reached into my pocket and retrieved my phone, making damn sure it hadn't gotten busted when laughing boy threw me all around two rooms. I brought up my contacts and dialed Hadraniel’s number. He picked up almost instantly. “Are you bloody kidding me? This worked?”

“Congrats, Limey Boy, now talk me through bringing you up here.”

Sam's voice came over the phone. "Alright, I've seen the Boss do this more than Ronny has, so I'll be giving you instructions. Go over to the computer in the corner opposite the desk."

I spotted said computer, sitting on a smaller desk with a simple chair in front of it. "Okay."

“Now, the last time I saw the Boss do this, he opened a file and brought up a spreadsheet.”

“A spreadsheet? Seriously? God does his reality changes on Microsoft Excel?”

“I think he uses a Chinese knockoff, honestly. Regardless, open up the spreadsheet and somewhere on there should be--”

I cut him off. “Gateway access?”

“Yeah, how’d you know?”

“It’s literally the first thing listed. Okay, all I need to do now is?”

“You just need to add our names to the spreadsheet.”

"You sure you and Hadraniel can do this?"

I could almost hear him nod. "Positive.”

The intercom buzzed back over on God’s desk. “What are you doin’, Danielle?” Karael asked.

Despite the fact that I was nowhere near the button, I answered, “Getting ready to kick your ass at your own game, fuckface.”

Naturally, Sam asked, "Who are you talking to?"

I bit my lip a second, then answered, "Nothing. Just… Get your asses ready, okay?"

"Yeah. Oh, and don't forget about your power."

I nodded, even though he couldn't see me. "You guys just make sure you get your end dealt with."

---

Azrael seemed the most impressed by the cabin. He kept looking in every drawer and cabinet, like he was rooting around for clues. Kevin was most interested in the refrigerator and finding something to make a sandwich with. Thandie was busy checking out the adjacent room, which was apparently a bedroom. My guess is that Raziel liked to have a place to sleep in peace and quiet.

Finally, Sam and Hadraniel each called for everybody's attention. Well, Sam tried. Hadraniel just went "Hey, tossers!" and everybody turned to them.

Kevin asked, "You're sure Karael can't see us here?"

Azrael answered, "Raziel's hiding spots were an open secret. Everyone knew they existed, but not how to find them. A clever man, Raziel.”

Thandie walked out of the other room. “Alright, boys, tell us what’s going on.”

Hadraniel started. “First of all, Dani and I came up with this.”

“Who cares, just get on with it!”

I stepped forward. “So, Hadraniel and I came to the conclusion that Karael wants me to get to Heaven, specifically to unlock one of the areas that any other angels or archangels could get to, all because God’s my daddy.”

Hadraniel nodded. “If that isn’t what he wants, he could easily stop everything we’re doing by pulling Azrael up there. He wouldn’t even need to come near Dani and risk his part of the power returning to her.”

I carried on. “The most important thing he could want from one of God’s private areas is access to God’s office, all to change things.”

Kevin asked, “What would he want to change?”

“We don’t actually know,” Hadraniel answered, “but anything would be concerning. No one, not even God’s offspring, contain his omniscience, something he made sure none of his creations would ever be capable of. Any changes Karael institutes could have massive ramifications on everything and he’d never know what he’d done.”

Azrael rubbed at his chin. “Of course. The Darkness wouldn’t be devastating enough for someone like him.”

Thandie said, “But changing reality would get him something anybody would want: Control.”

“He’d basically be replacing God at that point,” Sam added.

“What’s your plan?” Azrael asked.

“I’m going,” I answered, “and I’m gonna do my best to piss him off. From what I've seen of him in these visions I've been having, he'll start bragging as soon as possible. He'll show me what his plan is, then I'll just start insulting him, that'll distract him long enough for me to get to God's office and bring Sam and Hadraniel up."

Hadraniel added, “We’ll get into Records and start checking anything he’s already tried to alter.”

“How do you know he’s changed anything?” Kevin asked.

“He’d want his changes to take effect immediately, which means he’ll have already had someone in Records preparing the files he’d want to change,” Sam explained. “It won’t be anything small, either. You don’t Nakatomi Plaza Heaven unless you wanna fuck up something big.”

Thandie plopped down in the chair beside the fireplace. “What do you want Kevin and I to do?”

Kevin said, “I’d probably be useless up there.”

Azrael added, “You wouldn’t be allowed up there anyway. Magical beings get a pass, but ordinary humans aren’t allowed into Heaven unless given special access from God Himself.”

“Alright,” Kevin moped, “I can accept being sidelined if I don’t really have any options.”

I gave him a peck on the cheek. “Emotional support is nice.”

“Now, what about me?” Thandie asked.

---

“C’mon, Miss Danielle,” Karael said over the intercom, “just gimme a little clue.”

I closed out of the spreadsheet and made for the door. I was just about to turn the knob when something on the floor caught my eye. It was a letter, a handwritten letter, and it was being written to me. I picked it up and quickly scanned over it, then folded it up and stuffed it in my back pocket. I didn’t have time to think about it.

I shut the door behind me and grabbed a directory from the receptionist’s desk just outside God’s office. I looked at the foldout map and found exactly what I was looking for. Two floors down, room 681b, just across from a restroom. All I needed to do…

Just as I rounded the last flight of stairs, Karael slammed into me, basically tackling me into the wall. He grabbed me by the neck again (this seemed to be his favorite grabby spot) and shoved me against the wall, then lifted me upward. His dagger was in his hand, though it very quickly made its way to my throat.

"Now, I believe we were talkin' about you tellin' me what you were doin'."

Thanks to how high he'd hoisted me, my knee was at exactly the right level, so I managed to get enough leverage to knee him right in the crotch. He dropped me, thankfully, and I bolted out the stairwell. I didn’t want to waste anymore time than was necessary, and hopefully the angel brothers had already accomplished their goal.

I made it into the hallway and stopped. I recognized this hallway. It was the one my last vision encounter with Karael. But… No… No, he couldn’t have figured out what we were going to do way back then... This had to be a coincidence. A weird, creepy, confusing coincidence, but a coincidence nonetheless. I just needed to push it out of my head that Karael might actually be manipulating me into doing something he wanted. Again. Shit…

I looked around the doors and saw I was standing in front of rooms 600a, 600b, 600c and 600d. I quickly pulled out that director and saw that, yes, every number had four letters and all four rooms were in the same general vicinity. Great. That meant I’d need to hoof it past… Shit, over three hundred rooms to get to the one I needed to get to. The angel brothers had goddamned better have been right about this.

---

Where the hell Sam had gotten a chalkboard from was beyond me, but then again, this was his dad’s cabin of secrets. Maybe he had a whole collection of hidden objects around this place. Either way, he’d drawn the layout of a room and written the numbers six, eight and one underneath it, followed by the letter B.

“This is where you need to go once we’re up there,” he said.

“The Memorium?” Azrael asked.

“What’s that?” was Thandie’s question.

Hadraniel answered, “That’s where we keep a memorial to all the angels that have died.”

“If you think you’ll catch him off guard by showing him his late sister’s name on a plaque, you’re wrong,” Azrael said, solemnly.

I shook my head. “That’s not the plan at all, though maybe we’ll work it in. We’re running on the assumption that he’s got some way to keep the power of Death even when I’m close enough to him.”

“A wise assumption.”

“Right. I remember from what little reading I did that the power of Death just outright shuts down in places it will never be needed. The office, God’s office, places like that. There’s one place like that I can get him to follow me, and that’s the Memorium.”

Azrael walked over to the chalkboard. “Of course. There are no souls in the Memorium. The both of you would be reduced to your base angelic magic...”

“And Dani’s magic is more powerful than his,” Hadraniel finished the thought.

“But he’ll still have an edge, having been raised with his magic while Dani only recently learned of hers.”

I nodded. “And that is why we have our trump card.”

---

668a… 668b… 668c... Jesus Christ, this place was annoying. How the hell did anybody get anything done around here? All the doors looked the same, all the windows (except for the cracks) looked the same, all the everything looked the same, and I was pretty sure I’d run past the same water cooler five times in a row!

The worst part of it, though, was Karael. I couldn’t see him, but I knew he was following me. I could only keep moving to get him out of my thoughts, but that wasn’t working all that well. Honestly, I was starting to think it’d be a bit more manageable if I could hear the bastard talking, despite the fact that I didn’t want to hear his voice.

Naturally, despite never having made that thought known, the sonuvabitch heard me. “Tell me, Danielle, what’s your goal here?” His voice was calm, almost serene. “You havta know by now that the power isn’t just gonna come back to you.”

“Not now, but it shouldn’t take too much longer,” I called back to him. The echo in the hallway made it hard to pinpoint if he was right behind me or a quarter of a thousand rooms behind me. I was starting to wish I was a bat.

“Since you’re bein’ so difficult, I suppose I could monologue a bit. Ain’t that what proper villains do, after all?”

671a… “So you think of yourself as a villain? I thought you believed you were doing the right thing!”

He laughed. Jesus, that laugh was just creepy. “Of course I believe I’m in the right here, but that ain’t gonna change your mind no matter how much I try. So how about you shut up and listen?” I heard him kicking in a door somewhere back there. I wasn’t sure if he thought I was hiding in a room or if he just thought he’d confuse me. “First I’ll start with how your little girlfriend the queer fit into my plan.”

I stopped. He was doing this on purpose, to make me stop, but goddamn it, it was working. “Her name was Ginny, asshole.”

“Ginny, that’s right!” I heard another door get kicked in. “Stroke of luck, really. She’d been contemplatin’ suicide for a good long while. I didn’t even havta provoke her or anything, she just happened to play into things at just the right time. Once she jumped, so did I, into settin’ things in motion.”

I got back to walking. 672a. I only had under a dozen sets of rooms to go…

“I looked into her parents, saw how much they hated her. I got all the information I needed from one little afternoon of watchin’ ‘em.” His voice suddenly shifted, and I felt a chill through my spine. “Then cuh… Cuh… Cuh.. Came the fuh… Fuh… Funeral home.” He turned back to his real voice. “Bet you never expected that, did ya?”

“That old creepy bastard was you?”

“Spot on, little girl! And that text message from the queer’s mama? All me, sweetie pie. All to get you to overextend your reach and break the seal on the Angel of Death.”

“Which you knew I could do because you’d already found out I was God’s kid.”

“Bingo! Give that lady a see-gar.”

“I don’t smoke.”

“Too bad. Once you screwed up with the queer’s parents, it wasn’t that hard gettin’ God to pick me as the temporary vessel for the power. After all, I had an exemplary record and the Boss was still feelin’ guilty about what happened to my sister all those years ago. Maybe he thought he was makin’ up for somethin’.”

679d… 680a… There! 681b! I dove for the doorknob--

--and Karael’s hand grabbed it first. “What’s this? Goin’ to spend a little time amongst the souls of all the dead angels?” He went for a kick straight to my midsection, which hurt like hell. I threw a haymaker at his stupid face, but he ducked just in time to lunge at me and send me straight to the floor. “You hadta know I knew what that room was. See, unlike you, Miss Princess of Heaven, I’ve lived up here most of my life. And I spent the last seven months learnin’ everything I needed to know.” He stood up and reached for the doorknob. “You thought you could get me in here and use the fact that my powers would be nullified against me.”

“Then you should already know that just opening the door will expose us to the effects of that room."

He smirked. "Yeah, but I'm still pretty sure I've got the upper hand here." He turned the knob…

...And then a black, almost rusty chain wrapped around his arm. Another one went straight for his neck, and then the two of them pulled him into the Memorium. Two seconds later, he was thrown right back out, against one of the cracked windows opposite the door.

Out of the Memorium stepped Thandie, covered head to toe in a cloak that looked like it had just been burned, save for the dark wings that extended from the back. The chains she’d used to toss Karael around like a ragdoll hung loosely from her arms, and dragged along the floor. Her fingernails had grown considerably long, looking more like talons than anything else. Her skin had taken on a deathly pale color, though not counting the blood that appeared to be moving along what I could see of her arms. She tilted her head and I could see her face, a disturbing grin stitched on both cheeks. When she actually did smile, her teeth were broken, jagged fangs. Last but most certainly not least, her eyes were now blood red orbs with dot pupils that barely stood out.

Thanatos.

---

”Trump card?” Azrael asked.

I walked around behind the chair Thandie was sitting in and wrapped my arms around her. “Thanatos.”

Thandie spun around in the chair. “Um… what?!”

”The Memorium only nullifies the power of angels who have the power of Death. Power that comes straight from Heaven itself. Your power comes from Olympus, and won’t be affected by the Memorium in any way.”

She blinked. “So… You mean I get to be the one to wipe the floor with Karael’s ass?”

“At least until I take the power back from him. Then it’s my turn to tear him to shreds.”

She leaned up and kissed me right on the mouth. I swear, I thought Sam’s eyes were going to fall out of his head and his jaw would be stuck to the floor. Hadraniel just took a long drink, Azrael laughed and Kevin… Smirked.

“But how are you gonna get me up there if you’re only opening the Gates for Sam and Ronny?” she asked.

Hadraniel looked at Sam for a second, seemed to realize his brother was still catatonic, then finally answered, “That’s our job. Dani’s going to open the Gates for us to go straight to Records, and once we’re there, we’re going to change the opening to the Memorium, then add you to the list of those she’s allowing up there.”

“So, I’m going straight to the Memorium, where I’ll surprise fuck-up the evil angel?”

I nodded. “Basically.”

She smiled. “Oh, I’m gonna enjoy this.”

---

This was the first time I’d ever seen Thandie’s Thanatos form, and I sincerely hoped it would be my last. I quickly backed out of her way as she walked up to Karael and picked him up by his arm. I reached for and shut the door to the Memorium. Now was the time I set to work.

But before that, I watched as Thandie played around Karael, poking at his stomach with her talons, choking him with her chains. She was taking an almost sick pleasure in what would be considered mutilation if not for the fact that he was an angel and she was a demigod. She lifted him over her head and then dropped him right on her knee in a move that would have completely destroyed his spine, and I honestly wondered if it had, considering the bloodcurdling scream he let out afterward.

I sat down on the floor a few feet away from Thandie’s majestic beatdown. I took a deep breath and concentrated on my connection to the power of Death. If what Azrael said was right, then I’d just need to break through whatever magic hold he had over the power to get the transfer to work and the energy back inside me. I raised my arm and reached outward. I felt my tether connect with that of the power, just as Azrael said I would. From there, I just needed to…

...Suddenly, something hit me square in the everything. I opened my eyes and saw that the something was Thandie, who’d just been thrown so hard she was starting to change back to normal. I looked up and saw Karael had done exactly what none of us wanted him to ever be able to do.

He was now the Angel of Death.

I gently pushed Thandie off of me and stood up. Karael’s Angel of Death form was different from mine, though functionally the same. He was almost completely naked, save for a cloth covering his private parts, and his wingspan was slightly smaller than mine had been, though that could just have something to do with the hallway itself. He floated there, a sword in each hand, glaring at me with solid white eyes.

Holy shit, now I knew why Ginny’s parents were so afraid of me.

“You will not take the power away from its rightful owner, Danielle,” he said, in a voice that oozed angelic strength.

And yet, somehow, I felt my own strength. Strength I hadn’t had before. I looked down at my hand and realized the tether was still intact, still siphoning the power away from him. Holy crap, I actually still had a chance.

“Fuck!” Sam’s voice was suddenly beside me.

“Oh, bollocks...” Hadraniel said to the other side.

“Can you two not act like we’re about to lose, please?” I asked with a frantic tone to my voice.

“You may as well. I won’t let you win.” Karael laughed. “You’re in way over your head now, pretty thing.”

I felt the tether start to tug. Azrael said that might happen, that Karael might subconsciously be capable of rejecting the energy siphon, but I held strong. I wasn’t gonna fuck this up, not now. We were too close and I was too determined.

That was when I felt something else. Something… Extremely comfortable. I didn’t even need to look to know what it was, or to know that the tether had done its job. “Boys, you may wanna stand back a bit.”

“Why?” Sam asked.

“Look at her hands, you twat,” Hadraniel groaned.

Karael, who had just a moment ago been so completely sure he was about to beat us, now had a look of pure shock on his face as he too looked at my hand. I held up my scythe and let its weight in my hand turn into warmth. I felt the warmth spread outward from the scythe until it encompassed my entire body.

And then I let it out. I felt the wings extend from my back, felt my hair grow longer, and watched it change back from brown to pink. My clothes changed, becoming a simple white dress and completely bare feet. I was definitely right about my wingspan being larger than his, and my wings brushed up against the walls.

As Karael stared in stunned silence, I smirked. “Round Two, bitch,” I said.

I flew straight at him and swung my scythe at his face. He brought a sword up to block me at just the last second, but his little defensive maneuver dampened his hold over the power. I could feel more of it shifting to me through the tether. I couldn’t tell exactly how much either of us had, but since we could both use the Angel of Death form, I assumed he still held more of it than I did. I was probably using my literal God given magic to augment the power of Death.

He pushed back against my scythe with his swords and sent me into one of the cracked windows. I reached back and elbowed it, breaking it completely. He seemed to realize what I was doing and flew toward me. I slipped out the window into the skies outside the building just as his sword nearly punctured my lung. He followed me outside and just came at me swinging, causing me to rapidfire block him with my scythe. Eventually, I got fed up with that and grabbed his right hand. I squeezed and forced him to drop the sword into the sky beneath us.

“You think you can stop me…” he breathed. “You think that you can beat me?”

“Just give it up, asshole, seriously.”

He put some force into his swing and nearly came within an inch of cutting my wing. I briefly wondered how painful that would be since it was technically a magic limb.

“I was gonna SAVE PEOPLE! No one would havta deal with a broken home EVER AGAIN!” He took another swing, which I barely blocked. “Why is that such a bad thing, Dani?!”

I held my scythe ready. “Your goal isn’t bad. It’s really not. But your methods sure as hell were.”

He lunged at me. “I JUST WANTED A FAMILY! MY FAMILY!”

“And I get that!” I dodged just as his sword passed through the air where my head had been. “But you stole power though manipulation and murder!”

He grinned. “Then what’s one more?” he asked, this time without the Angel of Death reverb to his voice.

In fact, he looked like he was having trouble keeping himself aloft, keeping hold of his portion of the power. The tether was still sapping his power even though we were fighting, and it seemed he didn’t have much more of it left.

His next attack was probably his last.

I braced myself, ready for whatever he had in him. He readied himself…

...And then Thandie came out of fucking nowhere and tackled him back into the building.

“What the hell?!” I shrieked. Hell, even I’d dropped the reverb.

---

An hour later, the Gates to Heaven were properly reopened, and every angel that had been trapped in a different plane made their ways back to their place of employment/home. Honestly, I wasn't sure where any of these people lived.

The first happy face to greet me was Wendi, who gleefully hoisted me up in the air and hugged me so tight I was afraid I couldn't have children anymore. I missed out on the chance to ask her what she'd been doing the whole time we were beating up the asshole.

The whole of Heaven was cheering and celebrating. It even leaked down to Mobil, where I caught sight of Ginny dancing with some girl I'd never seen before. I hadn't told anyone that I'd reassigned her from Hell back to Mobil when I was editing God's spreadsheet. I didn’t think it was a particularly evil thing to do.

Inside the Heaven office building, the partying was no less apparent. It, of course, looked like a giant office party with big banners, lots of streamers and people dancing between from one office to the next. There was barely any room in the hallway because of all the partying, but I at least managed to get to the elevator without too many people realizing the pink-haired teenage girl sneaking past them was the hero that saved their home.

The elevator opened up to the receptionist’s desk just outside God’s office. The receptionist was gone, most likely downstairs in one of the five billion mini-parties that were going on between offices on every single floor. The door to God’s office, however, was wide open, and I could hear two people talking inside. One was God, the other was Jubril. And apparently I walked in on the conversation at just the right time.

“You know Karael couldn’t have done all this on his own,” Jubril said, a statement of fact, it seemed.

“Of course not, but it’s like whoever it is has managed to hide themselves from my omniscience.” God picked up a piece of his desk. “This is happening more and more, Gabe, and I’m not happy about it.”

Jubril nodded. “No kiddin’. Boss, we need to start taking this crap more seriously. First Lucian, now a straight up takeover. I can’t see this being the last time something this big is gonna happen.”

God finally realized I was in the room and said, “Gabe, let’s hold onto this conversation. I need to speak with Danielle.”

Jubril gave me a sideways glance, then nodded and walked out of the room. Just before he left the room, he patted me on the shoulder, then shut the door behind him.

So there I was. Standing face to face with the father I didn’t know I had. He was standing there holding a piece of his broken desk, and I was the one responsible for the broken desk. I was standing there, closer to the door and honestly wondering if I should just bolt and go back home. But I steeled myself for the awkward conversation that both of us knew was just around the corner.

I rubbed at my arm. “So… I found this…” I reached into my pocket and pulled out the letter he’d been writing to me.

He smiled faintly. “I was hoping to finish it before I gave it to you, but I suppose this wasn’t a bad time to find it.”

I held it out. “I haven’t read it yet,” I half-lied. I read a bit of it, but not enough.

He took it and sighed. “I didn’t know when you became Death.” He chuckled a second. “Honestly, I can’t remember when I learned. I tried to find a way to tell you, but it just never worked out the way I wanted.”

“It’s fine,” I said, “you have a lot more on your hands every day than anyone can ever know, and from what Azrael said, you’ve got a lot of kids you can’t really get around to spending time with.”

He leaned against the broken desk. “That’s not really an excuse. I haven’t been the best parent to any of my children, and that goes back to the very first one. Hell, I can’t even find Michael right now, though I’ve had my best people looking for him. I was never ready to be a parent, and yet I have all these children, all of them genuinely good people despite having such a neglectful father.”

I took a small step forward. “That’s not a bad thing, y’know.”

He nodded. “I know. But all of my other children at least knew who their neglectful father was.”

“Hey, I turned out just fine, and I never felt unloved. Never knowing about my dad never felt like a hindrance at any point in my life. I had my mom, I had my brother, I had friends.” I took a deep breath. “But what Karael said about there being too many broken families out there isn't wrong."

He nodded again. "He's not. But as much as I'd love to solve that problem, I gave my creations free will to make that decision on their own. To take it away would destroy everything I've done to make sure people have the right to choose for themselves." He walked over to me and put his hand on my shoulder. "But while my hands are tied on eliminating the problem, I can provide… Nudges, so to speak."

"Nudges?"

"Small, subconscious markers to perhaps try and pull a family together rather than tearing it apart. It won’t work for everyone, hell, it probably won’t work for most, but it’s a step on the path to helping put this problem to rest.” He pulled his hand away and walked back to the desk. “The last two years and all these crazy things that I haven’t been able to see have only made me realize I haven’t just been a neglectful parent to my children, but all my other creations as well. This incident in particular was just a giant right hook to my face, driving the point home.”

I rubbed at my jaw. Him saying that only made me think of when Karael socked me in the face earlier.

He turned back to me. “Another step toward fixing problems is to reinstate you as Death. You did quite a job saving Heaven from Karael, and it would be a mistake not to recognize that. I hope you can remember the ins and outs of the job, because it has been awhile.”

I smirked. “I think I can manage.”

He gestured to the broken desk. “However, you will need to work off a debt: replacing my desk.” The smile on his face told me he was joking. “Don’t think you’re getting out of all your punishments, young lady.”

---

The office was empty when I walked inside. I turned on the light and saw that it looked exactly as it had before all this Karael bullshit, except there was one addition: a non-scythe teddy bear sitting on the desk. I picked it up and found a folded up piece of paper underneath.

These last few days reminded me of the days Amriel was still around and my family was whole. I thank you, Danielle, and as a token of my thanks, I’ve given you the bear I was never able to give her. Don’t take this the wrong way, but please leave me alone in the future. I believe I’ve spent enough time in the company of Death.

Azrael

I smiled. Maybe I’d break that little request at some point down the line to buy him a Dr. Pepper.

The door opened behind me and in walked Hadraniel and Sam, both of them wearing some extremely nice suits. Matching extremely nice suits. Like, these guys actually looked like brothers for the first time since I’d met either of them.

“Welcome back to your office, Lady Death,” Sam said with a little flourish like he was bowing to royalty.

Hadraniel glared at him. “Cut that out, you wanker.”

Sam chuckled. “Anyway, the Boss rewarded you with your job back and rewarded us...” he gestured to Hadraniel.

Hadraniel sighed. “He rewarded us with a permanent position as your guardians and assistants. Oh, and he made me an archangel.”

Sam put his arm around his brother’s shoulders. “Yep. The first time a new archangel has been added since the Great Darkness. Not counting the folks who take the role of Death, because that’s the job that’s an archangel, the person just comes along with it.”

Hadraniel growled. “You’re far too happy about this.”

“C’mon, bro, this is big! And it’s the first time brothers have been archangels since… Well, it’s the first time!”

I sat down on my desk. “Well then, boys, since we’re all in this together…”

“What the hell are you on about?” Hadraniel asked.

I was about to suggest we all go to a party and celebrate all the good news we’d just gotten, but Wendi burst into the room before I got to open my mouth. “Ma’am! There’s an assignment waiting for you!” She reached into the briefcase she was carrying and retrieved a folder. “Something about a billionaire who just committed suicide in his prison cell.”

I sighed. “And the adventure continues…”

Sam squealed. “Oooh, can I come along?”

Hadraniel smacked him in the back of the head. “That’s not how this works and you know it!”

Wendi looked confused. “Am I missing something?”

~~The End~~